1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printer and, more particularly, to a printer capable of printing, on a print medium, marks indicative of cut positions corresponding to an outline region including an image region together with an image.
2. Description of Related Art
Various types of printers for printing an image on print paper, for example, a laser printer and an ink jet printer, are put into practice. The printer of this type is generally connected to external equipment such as a host computer. Image data of one page supplied from the external equipment is stored in a memory while an image of one page is printed on the print paper fed from a stacker or paper cassette on the basis of the image data.
In most of the printers, the external equipment actually sends data of at least a pair of corners in a diagonal relation in the rectangular outline region defining the image region of the image to be printed in addition to the image data. An operator sets the print paper to be printed in a paper cassette or the like prior to a print operation, and selects the size of the print paper on a console panel. The controller of the printer compares the printable region of the set paper with the outline region thereof. If the outline region is smaller than the printable region, the print operation is performed.
Generally, since in print paper there are top, bottom, right and left margins where the printing cannot be performed with the restriction of a paper feeder, the operator sets print paper of a size larger than the outline region. However, a predetermined standard size is required for the size of a document to be produced. If the size of the outline region is the standard size such as A4 and B5, the operator performs the print operation with respect to the print paper larger than the outline region, and then, cuts the printed paper into a desired standard size.
In the conventional printer as described above, the print paper of a size larger than the outline region including the image region is always necessary. Accordingly, when the size of the outline region is a predetermined standard size such as A4 and B5, the operator must mark the printed paper according to the required standard size after the print operation and cut the paper, with an attendant problem such as cumbersome cutting work.
Moreover, if the outline region is considerably smaller than the standard size of the set paper with an excessive blank margin, the operator must cut the paper into a suitable size after the print operation.